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"Technology is critical for innovation, yet schools struggle to get students interested in this area. Could teaching robotics change this? The Queensland government has just announced plans to make teaching robotics compulsory in its new curriculum - aimed at students from prep through to year 10. Robotics matches the new digital technologies curriculum, strongly supported by the university sector and states, including Victoria. But while, worldwide, there are increasing initiatives such as the Robotics Academy in the US to teach robotics in schools, Australia isn't doing enough to get it taught in schools. To explain why we should teach children how to program robots in schools, we first need to understand what a robot is. "

"Do your students struggle with writing COMPLETE SENTENCES that make sense when read aloud?  How about using CAPITAL LETTERS to begin their sentences and PUNCTUATION MARKS to end their sentences?  Sometimes I feel like a broken record when it comes to these writing requirements in my classroom! My second graders are required to write a biography as one of their writing projects during the year and I knew that I wanted something to motivate them to do these skills without being that broken record when they show me their work.  I think I found the PERFECT MOTIVATOR...QR CODES! "

"We all have them, some good and some bad. We pick them up from friends, family, and even strangers. But we may not recall who we picked them up from or when they began. Because we've practiced them over and over, these seemingly thoughtless repeated habits or behaviors, the pathways in our brain have become so broad, fast, and efficient in carrying them out that we do them automatically without even thinking. Yet these unconscious habits and behaviors add structure and order to our lives and help us to make sense of the world we live in. Our classrooms are full of them. We teachers are pros when it comes to employing and modeling good habits and routines that enable us to manage and carry out the many tasks and demands of teaching. And when it comes to teaching mathematics, we model and teach our students how to carry out procedures and algorithms flawlessly. But why is it that these same students often struggle when confronted with a problem to which the immediate answer is unknown?"

"Anyhoo… just last week I had the opportunity to try something with a group of kids who attend a school that caters for those for whom the mainstream education system simply doesn't work. Some of these students (currently all boys in Years 6-8) have severe behavioural issues, some have wellbeing issues and most have a combination of the two. I'm fortunate that I get to spend time with these boys on a semi-regular basis and so have been able to establish a bit of rapport with them. I determined that it might be interesting to play Minecraft with them… and just see what happens. I hypothesised that many behaviours that Dweck describes as being Growth Mindset behaviours would be evident whilst the boys played Minecraft: seeking out and embracing challenge persisting in the face of setbacks revelling in the struggle taking on feedback and being inspired by the success of others I then wanted the boys to reflect on this after playing… but first the set up!"

"Composing a story from scratch comes naturally to some people. For the rest of us creating a story from scratch can be a struggle. Over the years I've found that using pictures helps a lot of students get started on crafting stories. In some cases I've had students create collages to represent elements of a story. In other cases I've had them choose five pictures and write two hundred words about each. Being asked to write two hundred words about five pictures feels a lot less daunting than being asked to write one thousand words in one shot. The PDF embedded below (click here if you can't see the embedded document) outlines how to use ten of my favorite free tools to create image-based stories. "

"But when you're new at something, it's slow. It's painful, even. You suck at it. And when you realize you suck at it, you feel defeated. You second-guess every move. You are thinking so intentionally about every step that you sometimes feel like you are going nowhere. Over time, though, it becomes the backdrop. You've moved past the mechanics and you know what you're doing. It's a bit like driving a car. Remember when you sucked at driving? Remember when your heart would race if you went on the freeway? Remember when you had to tell yourself to turn on the turn signal? Well, that's what it's like when you are new at a creative process. You're suddenly the pimple-faced new driver trying to avoid an accident. I mention this, because I notice students who have never hit a place of creative fluency. They have no creative endurance. They give up quickly. They get frustrated too easily. They need too many instructions. But, honestly, it's because creativity has always been icing on the cake (which, honestly, is precisely what makes carrot cake a cake and not a loaf of zucchini bread). It's always been a "when we get to it" activity. It's been the culminating project. Then suddenly you have students who struggle to get anything done. However, it's not laziness. It's actually the byproduct of rarely getting the chance to make anything. "

"The iPad 2 is Apple's longest supported iDevice. Even though it was released in 2011, it still runs the latest - albeit stripped down - version of Apple's mobile operating system, iOS 9. A lot has changed since the iPad 2 was first released. Apple has developed faster processors, Retina screens, an entirely new cable, dedicated graphics chips, and a whole lot more. The iPad 2 uses an A5 chip while the latest iDevices use an A9. It doesn't have a retina screen and requires an old 30-pin iPod-era cable. The iPad 2 really can't handle the latest and greatest apps or games. In fact, it can struggle just running iOS  9. What was once a zippy tablet is now pretty slow to use. This isn't a problem if you stick to a single app, but jumping between them or launching new ones can take what feels like an age. This doesn't mean an iPad 2 is useless, it just means that how you use it has to adapt."

""There is no evidence that any amount of homework improves the academic performance of elementary students." This statement, by homework research guru Harris Cooper, of Duke University, is startling to hear, no matter which side of the homework debate you're on. Can it be true that the hours of lost playtime, power struggles and tears are all for naught? That millions of families go through a nightly ritual that doesn't help? Homework is such an accepted practice, it's hard for most adults to even question its value. When you look at the facts, however, here's what you find: Homework has benefits, but its benefits are age dependent."

"The history classroom was a mess. There were wires, nails, brads, and wooden pieces on every desk, and students around me struggled with a difficult task. I knew that, in the middle of the mess, I had reached a good balance between student independence and teacher instruction, between hands-on experience and historical material, when one of my students looked up and said, "Mrs. Pang, this is fun! It's really hard, but it's fun." She looked back down at the length of wire in her hands and kept winding it onto a large nail. She was following instructions to create the electromagnet on a telegraph machine. This student and her partner got theirs to work on the second try. Through this small making project, they were exploring the history of innovation and communication. At the same time, they were learning about making electrical connections, how to use tools, and how to troubleshoot their work when it failed. And they said it was fun. In my mind, they were referring to Seymour Papert's kind of fun: hard fun."

"Adilene Rodriguez admits she has always struggled with academics. Especially in middle school she hated getting up early, found her classes boring and didn't really see where it was all going. When she started her freshman year at Arroyo High School in San Lorenzo, California, just south of Oakland, she was a shy student who rarely spoke up in class and had little confidence in herself as a scholar. Rodriguez is now a senior and her approach to school has changed dramatically over her high school career. She attributes her shift to her freshman science teacher, Jim Clark, who taught the class about growth mindset from the very beginning and backed up the discussion with action. "He would tell me, 'You need to push yourself, that's how you're going to grow. Be confident. You're not always going to be successful on your first tries, but you can get there,' " Rodriguez said"

"Research shows that one of the best ways to engage students in content learning is to incorporate the arts. Because of students' openness to the arts, their motivation remains high, their attention spans tend to be longer, and their learning increases -- yet teachers sometimes struggle with how to incorporate the arts while maintaining academic integrity. No matter what type of the arts you desire to bring into the classroom -- music, visual art, creative writing, dance, etc. -- here are five guidelines to help prevent arts integration in the content classroom from simply becoming arts-and-crafts time."

"Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is effectively a set of 'complex disorders of brain development'. Most of us in education have dealt with students struggling with ASD and we know exactly what these students go through in their learning. But while ASD poses some learning challenges it should never be viewed as a crippling condition. Several ASD students, according to Autism Speaks, ' excel in visual skills, music, math and art'. As teachers, we need to work hard towards fighting the social stigma unfairly associated with ASD and the first place to start this fight is in classroom. There is a lot of misconception and misinformation surrounding ASD that should be unmasked to students.  To this end, we have curated for you a list of some great TED talks on autism you can watch with students in class.  You can also check these resources for apps and tools to use with autistic students."

"In 1962, Princeton psychologist Sam Glucksberg performed an experiment based on the classic candle problem test. He presented two groups with the same task, but with different rewards: One would receive monetary rewards based on speed, while the other was told only to complete the task as quickly as possible. The results were counterintuitive. The latter group performed the task on average three and a half times faster than the first. Why? As career analyst Dan Pink (Watch: The puzzle of motivation) has learned, traditional motivators like money can be far less effective than intrinsic motivators like autonomy, mastery and purpose. Indeed, productivity itself is a mystery we still struggle to unravel. Below, find seven must-reads (and a playlist) that look closely at how work works, provided by Pink for his TED Talk."

""I want to know the ways that they are thinking rather than the ways they are making mistakes," said Wees, who now works as a formative assessment specialist in mathematics for New Visions for Public Schools, an organization supporting public school teachers in New York City. "My interpretation that they're making a mistake is a judgment and usually ends my thinking about what they are doing.""

"We've all heard of helicopter parents. But you may not have heard of the latest term for a troubling trend recently identified in parenting: lawnmower parents. Lawnmower parents go to whatever lengths necessary to prevent their child from having to face adversity, struggle, or failure. Instead of preparing children for challenges, they mow obstacles down so kids won't experience them in the first place."

"Finding new and human ways to connect and empower the next generation to play is one of the ways that Ikea says it hopes to change the world, and bringing extra life to cardboard that would otherwise end up in the recycling bins is part of that push. It's an idea that came about quickly, and was revealed at a panel at Cannes today (20 June). Wunderman, Kantar Consulting and Mini Mad Things decided to put the pedal to the metal and workshop an idea in just five weeks. The catch? The idea had to be 'prototypeable' as the final would be presented on stage at Cannes Lions, alongside Ikea's chief marketing officer. Ultimately, the brief was to come up with an idea that shows how Ikea inspires and facilitates child's play, all while helping to improve home life for parents, whole families and even communities. After evaluating 17 years-worth of online conversation with parents and analyzing 15m rows of dialogue data, the team realized that behavior and development is the most talked about topic within childcare, second only to pregnancy. Pressing further in the research, the team learned that 50% of parents surveyed struggle to find ideas to encourage creative play amongst their children. Ikea, which has been one of the largest distributors of cardboard packaging, and team were able to flip their script so the brand could see the world through a child's eyes and create an interactive mobile app that brings cardboard waste to life. By following simple instructions any piece of cardboard can be transformed into something new. The Ikea Toybox app gives cardboard waste a new lease on life and, as play doesn't require a price tag, families will see big results with small means."

"f you ever struggle to make decisions, here's a talk for you. Cognitive scientist Tom Griffiths shows how we can apply the logic of computers to untangle tricky human problems, sharing three practical strategies for making better decisions -- on everything from finding a home to choosing which restaurant to go to tonight."

In our busy and highly connected lives it can be difficult to find time to slow down, to deliberately and mindfully engage in reflective contemplation. Taking the time to do so can be significant for success, creativity, mental well-being and learning and yet we seem to struggle to commit time to this valuable practice. Schools, in particular seem to offer little time for students to slow down and think, and with the busy lives students lead such time is often entirely absent.

"Nobody said that raising an adolescent was easy, and schooling one is even more of a challenge! Parents are taking on a lot of school responsibility, and let's face it -- things are different than they used to be. How are parents supposed to know how to handle the homework load without some guidance? Take studying, for example. If you are a parent of a struggling or resistant learner, you've probably heard more than one person suggest, "She just needs to study more." Most kids think this means filling in a study guide or rereading a chapter. But many don't learn by writing or reading. Their strengths lie in the visual, kinesthetic, musical, or social realm. How, then, are we to help our children develop their studying skills? The task does not have to be daunting. In fact, it can actually be simple and effective!"

"For the longest time, I was the project manager for 30 different projects. I would chart their progress and nag them about getting tasks done. Or I would set specific deadlines for the entire class. Over time, though, I realized that my students could learn how to manage their projects on their own. This is also why I believe in guiding students through a project management process. It's not perfect. Kids will still struggle to meet deadlines. Procrastination will still occur. But project management is a skill that improves over time. As students learn how to break apart tasks and chart their progress, they begin to think differently about their work. In the end, it becomes one of those life-long, transferable skills."